Lost Frontier – Losing Yourself In Strategic Enjoyment

The Wild West offered a time of kill or be killed in a struggle for survival with high speed action of horse back riding and duels. At least, that’s how it’s portrayed in the movies, but what if the Wild West was offered with a more thoughtful approach. Lost Frontier is a new turn based strategy game with a Wild West theme, and it comes from the makers of Zombieville and Battleheart. The heart of Lost Frontier is the story mode with 24 chapters that introduce 20 unique unit types, and an actual Wild West themed storyline. You get to play as a band of bounty hunters, and your goal is to track down a wanted man with steam punk technology and the supernatural included along the way.

Lost Frontier has a lot of flourishes, but the core turn based strategy gameplay is what truly stands out. The game nails the essence of the genre with challenge right from the get go that only increases as more units are thrown onto the scene with each new chapter. You really need to think about each move in terms of position, attack ability, and relation to other units in the game. You have long range marksmen, up close and personal cowboys, powerful posse s, vulnerable doctors, and more to contend with on each turn on both sides of the battle. You will likely loose a few times, and will have to rethink your strategy accordingly with the pure difficulty that each new chapter presents.

It’s great that the story mode has an actual storyline to add further enticement to go from level to level, and give reason to blasting away various enemies. If the story mode isn’t enough for you, there’s also a challenge mode with 20 missions based upon the story situations with even tougher layouts. Even though the game is challenging, the user interface is made as simple as can be for the genre to allow you to focus on the strategy. It’s effortless to move your units into position with the touch centric UI, and it’s always clear how each unit interacts with the world. You can also gain new units within a battle by taking over saloons, and the system cuts down on numerous menus and clutter to let you keep playing.

Lost Frontier ($2.99, Universal) is a superb strategy experience that is a must have for iOS.